The Tour Players' Classic, the first British stop on the 1997 Women's Professional Golfers' European Tour, started here in Macclesfield at the Tytherington Club yesterday.

Germany's Tina Fischer, winner of the WPGA Championship at Gleneagles last year, and Vibeke Stensrud of Norway, a former team-mate of Scotland's Janice Moodie at San Jose State University, lead by two shots after three-under-par rounds of 69. Anne-Marie Knight of Australia, European rookie of the year in 1996, is the only other player under par. Best of the five Scots on display is Myra Murray on 72.

Sadly, at this point it must be noted that not many people noticed much of the golf played on a fine, breezy day.

Here's why. At a stormy annual general meeting on Tuesday evening, Gill Wilson, the Tour's deputy chief executive, resigned after what she called the ''insulting behaviour'' of some professionals.

''Things got a little out of hand,'' said Scotland's Julie Forbes, a member of the Tour players' council, who shot 75 yesterday. ''Voices were raised and no-one stopped the shouting. The problem is a communication breakdown between staff and players. I'm surprised this hasn't happened sooner.''

Chairman and chief executive Terry Coates is poised to follow Wilson ''oot the door.''

He said: ''I was extremely frustrated at the attitude of a group of players at the AGM. Not one player stood up and opposed them. But my major concern is that the board did not support me. I hope there will be a board meeting within the next couple of days. At the meeting my position will be resolved. Right now I am staying on for the sake of the staff.''

The conflict, as always, is about money. ''A hard core of players believe that there are sponsors out there and I just don't talk to them,'' lamented Coates. ''And that the sponsors who have left the tour have left because I have not managed them well.''

At least on that score, Coates is correct. A sizeable number of players feel that he and Wilson haven't done enough to boost prize funds in the four years they have run the tour.

That isn't a charge Coates pleads guilty to, however. When he took charge there were 11

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tournaments worth #1.4m. Today there are 20 worth about #3m. ''In 1993, the Tour was bankrupt,'' he said. ''Now the auditors have just signed off on a third successive profitable year.''

Still, there is little doubt that the Tour has not grown fast enough to satisfy some players. ''The problem is that companies today are concerned with the bottom line,'' said Coates. ''There are no benefactors out there. Some players feel they deserve 25 tournaments at a minimum of #100,000 per event. But take this event. Because it is directly opposite the McDonald's LPGA championship in Delaware, all of our star names like Laura Davies and Trish Johnson are playing in the US this week. So it all becomes very difficult.''

He also pointed to the newly-inked five-year deal he brokered with Eurosport. ''We needed to place the Tour on television to 'showcase' the product,'' he continued. ''We achieved that initially with Sky plus two events on the BBC. Now we have a long-term contract with Eurosport, which will take the tour into virtually every European country.''

On a more parochial front, one area where Coates failed was finding a sponsor for the long-departed Scottish Open.

''We went to all the top companies,'' he insisted. ''But none were interested. There is a masculine thing in Scotland. You are a fairly chauvinistic country, especially when it comes to golf, and that is the basic problem.''

That explanation cut no ice with Forbes, however. ''I have heard from Scottish companies that presentations given by Terry and Gill were very poor,'' she said. ''It was all 'want, want, want.' That is never going to work. Any time I tried to ask him about it, he was always very evasive.''

Coates said: ''The players think the world owes them a living. They are young women with no business experience. They have never been to work. They don't understand why companies put money up for things.''

One thing companies are loth to put cash into is a mediocre product. Yesterday, in conditions which were never more than mildly tricky, only three players from the starting field of 121 broke the par of 72. No fewer than 24 failed to break 80. That isn't very good.

In contrast, Stensrud made her score with some fine play, particularly her approach shots. Only one of her six birdies involved a putt of more than 10 feet. After six months toiling on American mini-tours - she was player of the year on the Florida Challenge Tour last year - she was also happy to be playing in a fully-fledged 72-hole event in temperatures less than 85 degrees.

For Fischer, too, the weather was a nice contrast. Last week she competed in Japan. ''It was horrible,'' she said. ''It was so windy the balls were blowing off the greens. The good thing was that today I didn't notice the breeze at all.'' Making a few putts helps one forget the woes of the world, too. Fischer holed from 25 feet and 45 feet at the fourteenth and sixteenth respectively for birdies. ''My luck was in,'' she conceded with a big smile. ''But you need that to do well.''

Try telling that to Terry Coates, who sounded like a man whose mind was made up. ''Who needs to be around at the age of 66 to be insulted by a 25-year-old?'' he asked.

Who indeed? That, no doubt, was just one of the questions being discussed at last night's mandatory players' meeting. Leading scores (British or Irish unless stated):

69 - T Fischer (Germany), V Stensrud (Norway).

71 - A-M Knight (Australia).

72 - C Eliasson-Wharton (Sweden), E-J Smith, M-L de Lorenzi (France), M Murray.

73 - T Craik, S Gustafson (Sweden), F Pike (Australia), M Hjorth (Sweden), K Mourgue d'Algue (France), J Head, A Arruti (Spain), L Maritz (S Africa).

74 - M Adamson (S Africa), S Forster, H Wadsworth, P Rigby-Jinglov (Sweden), K Lunn (Australia), V Michaud (France), S Melin (Sweden), S Bennett, N Fink (Austria).

Others included: 75 - J Forbes. 77 - G Stewart. 79 - M Wright.